


Ring around the Rosie

by Esmethewitch



Category: Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Gen, Humor, Kidfic, Light Angst, POV Mike, Slice of Life, parental anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-18 16:00:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29120847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Esmethewitch/pseuds/Esmethewitch
Summary: Mike and Allison's daughter can see ghosts. Which is great, because she has a playmate roughly her age and a house of friends.Nobody's really sure why the girl can see them, though.
Relationships: Alison/Mike (Ghosts TV 2019), Mike (Ghosts TV 2019) & Original Child Character
Comments: 2
Kudos: 39





	Ring around the Rosie

The singing from downstairs was faint, babbled syllables mixing with the dawn chorus of birds from the hedgerows outside. At first, Mike thought he was imagining it. Then, the prickling fear that came with hearing a child’s voice singing in a creepy old house--no,  _ their  _ creepy old house kicked in. Could it be that a few years of unhealthy habits had taken their toll, he’d had a weird sort of mini-stroke and died temporarily, and now he too could see and hear the other inhabitants of Button House?

A second after this thought, he remembered what year it was, and that he now had a five-year-old child who loved mornings. Who was downstairs. Probably in the kitchen, judging by the way her little giggle echoed through the ventilation grille. He cast about for Allison, remembered that she was out of town overnight for a Historical Preservation conference, and a bit of networking to hopefully get noticed by some big-shot wedding and event planners. 

The kitchen was no place for a child. Hot water, knives, and heavy things. If she didn’t find a creative way to hurt herself, she might be throwing flour onto the floor and screaming happily about the “snowstorm”. Again. 

He bolted down the creaky stairs. Most of their friends thought it was surprising that  _ Mike  _ was the helicopter parent, and that Allison employed more of a laissez-faire approach. But Mike had been the first of them to see Daisy’s tiny face, and the first to feel the terror that only an anxious parent at the mercy of unseen forces could feel. 

He skidded to a halt by the pantry, where Daisy danced in circles with her arms outstretched, stubby little hands grasping something unseen. “Ring around the rosie, pocketful of posies, ashes, ashes, we all fall down!” Another voice was singing along with her, in lower tones. Shrieking, she flopped to the floor. Then got up in a second, as it wasn’t far to fall. 

“Can we do it faster this time?”

It took Mike a second to realize his daughter wasn’t talking to him. Daisy’s unseen playmate must have responded, for soon she tore around the floor by the pantry singing Ring Around the Rosie in double time. At “all fall down”, she slipped on her socks and onto her bottom, but due to her short legs, she just laughed. 

She turned around to see him. “Daddy! You’re up!”

“Having fun with an imaginary friend?”

“Jemima isn’t  _ imaginary.  _ She’s just dead.”

There had been a little girl who died of the plague who haunted the pantry, Mike recalled. According to Allison, she was quiet and retiring except when she wanted to sing Ring around the Rosie, and the living could hear her sometimes. Even the other ghosts just called her the “Plague Girl”.

Mike looked at the space of air that this ghost-girl might have occupied. “Oh. I’m sorry, Jemima. I’m Mike, Allison’s dad. I hope you were having fun.”

Daisy listened for a second. “She says she already knows who you are because she’s been here since she died and you live here, but she says thank you for being polite.”

She straightened up. “Can you play with me?”

“We need to eat breakfast. And I need some tea.”

“Aww.”

“If you eat, we can play after. Okay?”

“Okay.”

They had eggs and toast. In the process, Mike smelled burning and feared burnt toast or a stroke, but he surmised it was just Mary. It helped that Daisy had brightly said “Hello Mary!”, and waved to a point behind him.

His wife and daughter could both see ghosts, while to him they were as insubstantial as a flickering lightbulb, a cup knocked off the table, or a Google search gone awry. They thought nothing of Daisy’s ability when she was a baby; after all babies could usually see ghosts.

But even as she learned to walk, she kept waving to her invisible friends. Allison said that Mary thought this meant she had witch’s blood in her, but that was alright because Allison had renounced Satan and so had Daisy. 

After the dishes were cleared away, Mike asked what game they wanted to play. 

“Hide and Seek!”, Daisy beamed. “That way, everyone can play. But I’m seeking.”

Curled up behind a couch, Mike could hear half of her conversations. “Found you, Kitty!”

Eventually, Daisy found him, Jemima, and Mary as well. After a couple more rounds, she tired of this game. “I wanna build something with blocks now.”

They sprawled out on a threadbare Oriental rug, building cities and towers with faded colorful wooden bricks smoothed by many generations of hands. He had things he should have been doing round the house by now, but this was fun. Occasionally his daughter would chatter to others: 

“No, it’s not an army fort! It’s a princess’s castle. She hasn’t got any enemies, because she’s nice.”

“Dunno where the horses are going. Maybe they’re really tiny horses.”

She’d explain the complicated plot of an imaginary story to him too, thankfully. Apparently the castle was home to a Princess who could make insulation out of candyfloss, and this feat had won her the status of royalty.

Watching his little girl still in pink unicorn pyjamas play, it suddenly hit him. He knew why his daughter could see ghosts. He’d been there when the team of worried doctors and nurses placed the tiny oxygen mask over her face, when skin turned from blue to purple to pinkish, with hints of the brown it was now. He recalled how they couldn’t go home right away, how Allison and the baby were kept for observation. 

“Daddy? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I am. Never been better. ‘Cos you’re here with me.” He opened his arms for a hug, and she came to him. He held her tightly, determined not to cry.


End file.
